


Except It Isn't

by semele



Category: Vampire Diaries (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-14
Updated: 2013-04-14
Packaged: 2017-12-08 12:25:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,007
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/761283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/semele/pseuds/semele
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Elena thinks about the future.</p><p>Set in an imaginary (nearish) future in which s4 didn't happen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Except It Isn't

Elena thinks about the future.

Not too often, of course; she's too young to think about it too often, and she really minds her age these days. Sometimes she even thinks about going to college or getting a job. It's a habit to think about that, but then she remembers she can go to college many times, she can have all sorts of different jobs, whatever she wants, really. Whatever she wants.

(She just has to want.)

Damon is a part of all this, except when he isn't. Imagining Damon in the future is almost as hard as imagining him in the past. He's eternally stuck in the present as if he remained still while the world moved around him further and further. (Elena is a part of all this, except when she isn't.)

The present isn't half bad, actually. Usually it's just them, they laugh and they kiss, or they bite and their kiss, either, sometimes both. Elena loves the way Damon always pulls her closer, places her hand on his neck when he wants her to wrap her arms around him. Closeness is enough for them most of the time.

But then, sometimes it isn't.

Yet another Important Town Event is about to happen, some ridiculous Gone with the Wind theme party, so Elena breaks out her period costume. Following an impulse she prefers not to explain, she brings it to the Boarding House to try it on. Sure, she needs to check if everything is okay, no missing buttons or torn lace, but there's no reason for her to not do it at home, no reason at all.

Unless, actually, there is a reason.

Damon doesn't say a word when he sees her at his door, doesn't make snarky comments or ask unnecessary questions. She's completely transparent to him, and she doesn't even care, doesn't try to hide her face or make up excuses.

“Help me out, will you?” she says simply, and Damon takes one of her bags as he leads way to his bedroom.

Once she's standing in front of his huge mirror, she strips naked without hesitation, puts her hair up in a messy bun before she starts pulling clothes out of the bags. She's a bit fuzzy on details when it comes to undergarments, not that it matters if she gets them exactly right.

Damon chuckles a bit as he starts picking stockings, petticoats and a chemise out of the pile. Corset comes last, Elena knows that much, and she'll need his help with it, but now she simply takes things he hands her and puts them on one after another. She can feel Damon's gaze on her fingers as she gradually covers herself, and once again she feels unbearably silly, like a little girl playing pretend.

“You must be more used to taking those off than putting them on,” she says just to say something.

“Not really,” answers Damon as he smooths the petticoat in his hands. “We rarely got naked during sex,” he explains, seeing her puzzled look.

“Did you have a lot of sex?”

“Less than you'd expect.”

Finally he steps behind her and helps her secure the corset around her waist. Elena can feel a quick kiss on her neck before Damon starts pulling at the strings. She knows he watches the material carefully, looking for holes or stains, but then suddenly something shifts in the silence of the room, and Damon's hands go softer.

He rests his open palm on her back, the strings falling neatly in place above it, and a breath catches in Elena's throat. There's something very delicate in Damon's movements even as he's pulling hard, catching her waist in an iron grip, and Elena grows still under his fingers, the marble statue she is.

(A copy of a copy of a copy.)

“You're quite a handmaid,” she whispers as she finally lets herself find his face in the mirror.

She expects to see him changed, expects the lace and petticoats to bring innocence out of his eyes, but when she looks there's nothing, nothing at all, not even a spark. So she turns around, impatient, never mind the half-laced corset that immediately feels looser on her waist.

“Do you want me to be?” asks Damon calmly as if he didn't notice she ruined his work, and okay, maybe it wasn't _his_ innocence Elena was looking for.

So she turns back.

Damon picks up where she interrupted him, and Elena takes a deep breath as she watches herself turn into stone inch after inch, her arms and legs so heavy she doesn't think she'll ever move them again. She makes herself look at her own face, so different than usual, and when Damon reaches to untie her hair, she smiles a wolfish smile just to see how it would suit her.

“You're wearing a costume,” she says finally, and Damon in the mirror gives her a quick nod.

“I know I am,” he says simply.

That's what will happen to me, she thinks as she lets her yellow dress envelop her, different clothes and different names, and the language in her head getting older and older until it's nothing more than a joke. 

“Don't undress me tonight,” she asks.

He sinks under her petticoats not an hour later, her back painfully straight as she lifts her leg to give him access. Her shoe looks ridiculous resting on his modern shirt, and maybe that's what they always were, nothing more than some strawberry lip gloss smeared on a century-old ribbon. Damon looks good on his knees, with Elena's skirts wrapped around his shoulders. A part of her wants to ask if this is how he did it with Katherine, but then she looks at the mirror and starts laughing. She pulls Damon up for a kiss, presses herself to him so close she would probably feel his hard-on if they weren't separated by this ridiculous dress.

(She makes him take her from behind, and he bends her so hard her corset strings crack.)


End file.
